Handheld scarifiers which are powered by portable power sources, such as chainsaws, are known. For example, Canadian Patent No. 1,231,034 describes a rotary debris remover which forms an attachment to a chainsaw and comprising a hub driven by the chainsaw motor and provided with a plurality of flexible spring steel tines extending radially outwardly from the centre of rotation of the hub. The tines are fixedly anchored to the hub. While this scarifier has been found to be effective, it has nevertheless been found that the tines are prone to breaking on impacting hard objects, such as rocks, and the broken tines must be replaced which requires interruption of the operation of the debris remover.
It is accordingly an object of the present invention to provide a rotary debris remover which alleviates the above-mentioned difficulties and which has further advantages which will become apparent from the following description.